Libya's Displacement Crisis

Libya faces a bleak humanitarian crisis, the result of the country's descent into civil war in the summer of 2014 following the 2011 revolution. Hundreds of thousands of Libyan citizens are uprooted within the country and many more are sheltering in neighboring states, particularly Tunisia. Drawing on in-depth interviews with policymakers, practitioners, and displaced Libyans both inside and outside the country, Megan Bradley, Ibrahim Fraihat, and Houda Mzioudet present a brief, yet thoroughly illuminating assessment of the political, socioeconomic, security, humanitarian, and human rights implications of the continued displacement of Libyan citizens within and outside their country. Assessing the complex dimensions and consequences of the situation, Libya's Displacement Crisis lays the groundwork for what comes next. Acknowledging that the resolution of this crisis hinges on a negotiated end to the Libyan civil war, the authors present ideas to improve assistance strategies and to support durable solutions for displaced Libyans with implications for refugee crises in other parts of the world, including Syria and Iraq.Georgetown Digital Shorts -- longer than an article, shorter than a book -- deliver timely works of peer-reviewed scholarship in a fast-paced, agile environment. They present new ideas and original texts that are easily and widely available to students, scholars, libraries, and general readers.

Stellar analysis of Libya's war . . . astute observations regarding the need for more durable "reintegration" solutions . . . break[s] the barrier of distance and challenges us to do the same.

Megan Bradley is assistant professor of political science and development studies at McGill University, a nonresident fellow in foreign policy at the Brookings Institution. Ibrahim Fraihat is a senior foreign policy fellow at the Brookings Institution's Doha Center, adjunct professor in international conflict resolution at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service in Qatar. Houda Mzioudet is a freelance journalist, commentator, and researcher on Libyan and Tunisian affairs and the coauthor of the Brookings Institution's Doha Center analysis paper (with Roman David) titled "Personnel Change or Personal Change? Rethinking Libya's Political Isolation Law."